MELISSA
My name is Melissa Kahn. I am a Managing Director at State Street Investment Management and in charge of retirement public policy here at State Street. Today, I'm going to be interviewing Hunter Railey. Hunter, thank you so much for doing this interview. Before we even jump in, I want to congratulate you on the recent announcement of adding another state to the partnership, Minnesota. We'll talk about that in a little bit. Just to kick us off, can you tell us a little bit about your background and how you came to be the Executive Director of the Colorado SecureSavings Program?
HUNTER
Absolutely, and thank you for having me. I came into this role through a roundabout way. My background is primarily working in politics and public policy. Prior to working with the Colorado Department of the Treasury and the SecureSavings Program, I worked as a policy analyst at a national think tank, a clearinghouse for education policy. I also, following that, worked for a small business advocacy group called Small Business Majority. While I was at Small Business Majority, the Colorado SecureSavings Act, and more specifically, the auto-IRA program that I am now currently directing, was part of the policy portfolio that I was working on. Over the course of about three years in that role, I had the opportunity to refine, work through the stakeholder process, understand auto-IRA programs from the policy perspective a little bit better, and then follow the program through the study board that Treasurer [David] Young led. And then when the program was finally put into law, I applied for the Executive Director role, and that's how I wound up here.
MELISSA
That's fascinating, and it's great that you're involved in public policy. I know that you do a lot in terms of the public policy arena. We'll talk about that, obviously, in a little bit as well. Hunter, let's talk about the Colorado [SecureSavings] Program. Can you give us the current status of the plan in terms of the number of employers participating and the accounts established?
HUNTER
Sure. We just ended the quarter not too long ago. We're about two and a half years into implementing. As it stands right now, we're coming up very close to 83,000 funded accounts. In auto-IRA parlance, that is accounts that have been opened, and an employer has done a payroll contribution on behalf of that saver . We have over 17,000 registered employers, and at this point, we're looking at about 63,000 employers [combined] that have either registered and enrolled, or that we've certified exemption for. So, we've touched a pretty broad swath of employers in the state of Colorado. And at the present moment, at least as the numbers came out yesterday on July 7th, we had about $136 million in assets in the program. Not terribly large at this point, but growing at a pretty good clip as it stands right now.
MELISSA
That's fantastic. And we are going to talk about the partnership in a little bit. I'm going to come back to that to expand on that answer. But in the meantime, let's talk about the key challenges and successes that you've observed in implementation of state auto-IRA programs generally, and obviously, specifically with regard to the Colorado plan.
HUNTER
Sure. I think the big macro challenge is, nationally the folks who are not saving for retirement is either 40% to 60% of the working age population, depending on whose numbers and how you're counting them. It's not just that these folks lack access to a savings vehicle, it's that this is actually a pretty substantial behavioral change in how they go about their day-to-day financial lives. Generally speaking, we've designed these auto-IRA programs to be a “set-it-and-forget-it” model. But even that creates some challenges when savers receive disclosures and documents with a bunch of things that they may or may not understand, and wonder where their funds are going. Providing good quality information, doing our best to work with employers, and providing a good clear call center through our vendor that will actually respond to these questions and provide good feedback and good information has been pretty critical to overcoming that behavioral challenge in the near-term.
As we go through expanding the program and implementing the program, we have to deal with the challenges that normally come up with administering any large state-led program, which is data quality issues, understanding who should be in this program, who is currently not, and then generally just making sure that folks understand the regulatory parameters that they need to operate under. For instance, with employers really reinforcing that they cannot match funds going into these accounts, that they cannot be, to the best of their ability, providing a thumb on the scale for their employees as to whether or not they should participate in the program̶-stuff like that is going to be pretty consistent over the long term. And we haven't really even gotten to the biggest issue in my opinion, which is, once folks are enrolled in the program, how do we convert this from just a savings vehicle into what will ultimately be a retirement savings account?
If you think about a young employee who is just starting their savings journey, how do we communicate and work with this person at age 25 and make sure that they're making all the right choices from age 25 to 65, or whenever they decide to retire, and keep putting money into their account and understand that it's there at the end of the day? So that'll be the next step in our thinking as we move forward.
MELISSA
A lot of challenges, but it looks like you're up to the job for sure. You touched on this a little bit in your last answer. I want to pick up on understanding how these programs are complementary or at odds with federal regulations, legislation, and public policy in general. Can you talk generally? How do the state auto-IRA programs align with federal regulations, and what steps are being taken to ensure compliance with ERISA and other federal laws?
HUNTER
Sure, I can hopefully provide a good answer, from someone who is not a lawyer. I'm sure many of the listeners here understand what ERISA is. So ERISA creates a series of administrative obligations that a plan sponsor would have in the course of facilitating a private retirement plan. What we have found, and in particular what was found, in the study board that led to Colorado passing this law, is that many of those administrative burdens are just far too challenging for small employers in particular. The restaurant owner doesn't get into owning and operating a restaurant to manage a retirement plan. They make food and they want to provide that level of service. The way these programs were designed was as sort of a workaround to ERISA, that acknowledged the protections in ERISA, and sought to provide those through auto-IRA programs without triggering an ERISA preemption that would create all sorts of problems. Really what these programs try to do is provide a Roth IRA to participants that has default investment options selected where there is somebody overseeing this system and doing so in a way that doesn't trigger a preemption that would conflict directly with federal law or create unintended legal obligations for employers who are facilitating the plan.
MELISSA
That's great. And I think it really explains it in pretty lay terms. So, it's good that you're not a lawyer. I want to follow up on that: are there any recent legislative changes or proposals that could impact the structure or operation of state auto-IRA programs, either in a good or bad way?
HUNTER
There's a lot going on that could impact these programs. Starting with the more immediate portion of this, Secure 2.0, which was passed several years ago by Congress is, I think, going to be a boon to these programs. And not just these programs, but private retirement plans as well. There's a lot of incentives for employers to start offering something. And that, coupled with, in Colorado SecureSavings, offering a private plan or facilitating the state program is a requirement. This really is going to help broaden retirement savings in states that have adopted something. And I think that's going to be really positive across the board.
Within Secure 2.0, the Saver’s Match would be the provision that most directly touches auto-IRA programs. This is essentially a federal match to low-income savers who save for retirement over the course of a tax year. We're figuring out the details right now on how this would work with the state programs. Thinking about perhaps some regulatory provisions or perhaps even some statutory language that would help facilitate this a little bit better. But generally speaking, the state programs have a lot of folks that tend to fit the low- to moderate-income range who are doing their best to save for retirement and who could really benefit from some additional federal dollars moving into these accounts long term. We've got a little bit of time, but it's going to be a big lift to make sure that this aligns really well with how states are operating their state programs.
Beyond that, the Big Beautiful Bill has passed. While that doesn't directly impact the work we're doing, some of the changes with public benefits in particular may have some downstream impacts. State auto-IRA programs largely are dealing with people who may be a little stretched month to month. So, if there's some instability in their benefit outlook or with their employment, that may impact these programs downstream in an indirect way.
And then in the more abstract sense, I've heard that we're already talking about Secure 3.0 potentially, and Congressman Neal has proposed a federal auto-IRA program. And then Senator Hickenlooper in the Senate has essentially proposed a mandatory TSP [Thrift Savings Plan] or federal program as well. We're monitoring those to see how they're going to impact, and more specifically, how we can align these federal attempts to close the retirement savings gap with the existing state attempts. But there's a lot moving right now.
MELISSA
Wow. I'm exhausted listening to all that. I'm glad you're on top of it all. And with the Saver’s Match, I totally agree with you that that could be a game changer in terms of the amount of money that these individuals can save in these programs. Obviously, we're working with you and the other states to make that a reality. Fingers crossed they'll get through all of the administrative hurdles that they need to from the Treasury Department.
Hunter, let's talk a little bit about participation and enrollment. Can you talk about the strategies that you're employing in Colorado right now to increase employer and employee participation in the program?
HUNTER
Again, going back to some of the previous questions and the responses that I had there. This is a sizeable population that is not currently participating in a workplace retirement plan. There are very specific reasons for this. We've already cited administrative burdens as one, costs as potentially another. But there's also, and Colorado is a great example of this, there's some deep-seated cultural apprehension with financial services. Outside of the I-25 corridor in Colorado, which is where Denver, Boulder, Fort Collins, Pueblo, Colorado Springs, all the major population centers sit, we have a very rural state and there's a lot of folks that don't have any real close touch points with financial institutions. And that creates some cause for concern with putting money that may or may not be stretching you financially into a system that you don't fully understand.
The way we approached this in Colorado was really to segment the state first and foremost in our first year of implementation into cultural regions and really try to tie our messaging and our outreach and engagement to those cultural regions to really speak to the individuals in terms that really resonated with them on the ground. Speaking in broad terms, the Western Slope, Eastern Colorado – these are areas of Colorado that rely heavily on what we would consider to be small and medium sized firms. These are the firms that are most stretched to provide benefits, a robust benefit package to employees. We're really trying to talk to them about long-term sustainability for their communities and for their businesses.
In commercial regions, one of the benefits in theory of auto-IRA programs is that, because it's a Roth IRA account, it's not tied to the employer. It's therefore portable with employees. In areas like Denver where, again going back to the restaurant and service industry, where folks may be working multiple jobs or bounce in between employers at various points during the year, you can continue saving in one single account across multiple employers, provided they're facilitating the program. So, we were really trying to speak to employers and employees about the benefits as we see those benefits and how they would understand those benefits where they're currently living.
In terms of increasing engagement, as I mentioned before, getting people into the program and starting the savings journey was the first hurdle. The next one is going to be how do we convert this to a retirement system in the proper sense of the word. What we're working on right now and what is going to be our project for the next several years is building out the core infrastructure that's going to allow us to communicate with savers, with employers; do so consistently and make sure that we're connecting them to resources in their community; helping them understand the value of savings.
And on the employer side, really trying to connect our marketing and branding to some of this messaging to really reinforce a message that it's not just that you're checking a box, complying with a state law, but that you are really supporting and helping the state of Colorado and the residents in it pursue a better quality of life throughout their working lifetimes and beyond. And that's going to be really important to land those points, land those projects effectively if we're going to continue expanding this program.
MELISSA
Really fantastic. And I find it fascinating how you're segmenting different areas of Colorado because there is so much diversity within the state in terms of the types of employers and how they're responding to that. I think you've answered a lot of questions about the administrative burdens and how you're addressing specific needs. I'm curious if Colorado is doing anything different from other states in terms of these issues of reducing administrative burden and how you reach small businesses versus other states, for example, in the Northeast, which are not necessarily as rural as Colorado.
HUNTER
I can speak a little bit to where we kind of got the jump. And I think if there's a matter of difference between what Colorado is doing versus say Maine, Delaware, Vermont, who are partner states with us, it's that we had a longer lead time during the program design phase prior to starting. Everything we're doing in Colorado we are sharing with our partner programs. And, to their credit, they are adopting a lot of these best practices to the best they can within their capacity. I think in Colorado, one of the things that we're really benefiting from in a lot of respects is that Colorado is very much a local control state. A lot of the pitches that we're bringing to folks outside of the Denver metro area is, approaching county commissioners or economic development corporations and saying, you're going to be on the hook for your own local issues. How are you going to pay for this long term? And really working towards getting that consistent stakeholder buy-in because, among other things, we haven't really had concentrated opposition to this program beyond the legislative fights to get it enacted into law. Most of the partners have raised concerns, but they've been really pragmatic about how we've gone about solving for those and they've been really trustworthy in how they've engaged with us in assuming that this was actually going to be as easy as we said it was going to be. And so far, I think we've hit the mark there.
Just to round out that answer, what are we doing that's different from other states? I don't know if I can accurately answer. What I can tell you that we are really emphasizing, is that the point of the program is to make this as easy as humanly possible. And we're trying to let that simplification pervade everything we do from our messaging all the way down to the regulations. The regulations in particular lead employers with a set of three steps. You have to register and enroll your employees or file an exemption if you already have a plan. You have to auto-enroll your employees and then you have to fund the accounts when the time comes. Those are the only obligations for the employer. And we've designed the program in our systems to accommodate that.
MELISSA
That's all amazing. I want to follow up on one thing that you mentioned with regard to the participants. I think you said with regard to savers that you are currently, or will be, providing resources for them. And I'm just curious, are you doing anything in particular with regard to financial education in general? Why is it important to save? Why is it important to save early, that kind of thing? Is there something specific that Colorado SecureSavings is doing in that regard?
HUNTER
I think where even some of the more mature programs are at right now as they've scaled up, I won't say that they've fully implemented and that every non-compliant employer is now in compliance with their state statute, but where they've hit the mark is they've expanded enrollment in state programs and private plans. Now collectively, the state programs are looking at what the next iteration of this is. I think there are some ideas being floated around some of these state programs, but I don't think anybody has really come up with a plan and executed a way to communicate with all the savers in their network on a consistent basis and provide financial literacy resources or do anything by way of resource navigation. We're hoping that we will not be the only state doing this at the end of the day, but we're really trying to build this out in a way that is both novel and really resonates with who we understand the savers to be at the end of the day.
And I think on that final point, what I would really point to as a core distinction of these state programs versus your standard 401(k) and workplace retirement plans is that, again, this is a population that is generally lacking in financial services. That's not uniform across the board. There are some folks that, you know, obviously have bank accounts and whatnot, but this is a population that by definition is underserved in a lot of respects. It's not just that we can pump out financial literacy resources in that people are going to consume them and know what to do with them. There's going to be a fair amount of learning that we're going to start engaging with of who are these savers, exactly? What are their friction points? How can we work to reduce those? And what resources do they need?
MELISSA
That's amazing. That's great. Thank you. Hunter, we both sort of touched on the state partnerships, so let's explore that in more depth. Can you elaborate on the existing interstate partnerships for the state auto-IRA programs such as the one in your state, which is the Colorado led Partnership for a Dignified Retirement. How do these partnerships benefit participating states and their residents?
HUNTER
As it stands right now, there are two interstate collaborations. We'll set the Partnership for a Dignified Retirement aside. I know Connecticut and Rhode Island have started working towards a partnership together. They haven't yet launched Rhode Island's program in partnership, but they're working on getting the governance agreement together and working through those details. The Colorado Partnership, the Partnership for a Dignified Retirement, was the first multi-state partnership for these auto-IRA programs. Really, where the benefits come in here is that, at the end of the day, the fees and the costs for savers are going to be a reflection of the scale that state programs can hit.
Colorado is a mid-sized state. We could probably facilitate a state program by ourselves. But there are a number of states where starting a state program is going to be extremely expensive, either in terms of just immediate upfront costs to the state, or on the back-end through participant fees. The way Colorado thought about this was we had the opportunity to work through the details with New Mexico and design this. But our mentality here is that this is a really critical benefit. Most importantly, this is one that is going to have a direct correlation to public finances long-term in a given state. And we should facilitate that and do so in a way that allows other states to benefit from the pricing that we negotiated through our procurement. And more importantly, the partnership allows states to offer the benefit with less upfront design work and procurement and government bureaucracy to offer that in a more timely manner to their employers and their savers.
MELISSA
That's all great. I know I mentioned at the outset congratulating you on adding yet another state to the Colorado-led partnership, and that's Minnesota, which is also a mid-sized state in terms of the employer population. Aside from Minnesota, are there any other new interstate collaborations being considered or in development or any new states that you might be interested in adding to your partnership?
HUNTER
As it stands right now, if there's a new state that passes an auto-IRA bill, we'd love to chat with them. We think we have a really good structure and at this point it's been proven to be able to launch a state program relatively quickly. One of the states that we haven't had a chance to speak with yet, but who just recently amended their legislation, is the state of Hawaii. Hawaii is a state that, with its existing population, would fit the category of struggling to launch their own state program in a cost-effective way. And we'd really love to have a chat with them when they feel it's time to start working through their options. I know Washington is going to be going through a process to figure out how it wants to approach this. Washington's a pretty sizable state, so it's got a little bit more flexibility there. And then beyond that too, I know I would be remiss if I didn't flag that there are several red states that have really started talking through whether this is something they'd like to consider. Treasurer Johnson in Kansas has been a pretty vocal supporter of auto-IRA programs and we'd love to extend and help them out, if only to get a statute in place. And I know the bill came up in Georgia as well during the last legislative session.
MELISSA
Just so you know, I'm available if you have to go to Hawaii to talk to them. Just putting that out there.
HUNTER
We've got like a 200-person junket ready to go at this point.
MELISSA
That sounds great. Okay. Let me ask you another question. How do states decide whether they're going to partner? I think you've touched on this with other states or whether they're going to administer their auto-IRA programs independently—what factors influence those decisions?
HUNTER
There's a couple of big factors that come into play here. The first is going to be the state population. Minnesota was kind of an interesting example because they probably could have gone either way. And it really comes down to who the oversight entity is. Minnesota has the state board of investment that was making that decision. They're already in an ABLE partnership and they were pretty comfortable with how those engagements work. When they were working through their partnership process and their due diligence, what they were really concerned about was how are investments being monitored? How are decisions being made in the governance structure? Those are the types of things that are largely going to swing a state.
In other cases, when you look at our initial three partners, which were Maine, Delaware, and Vermont, really small states in terms of population, they almost certainly could not offer a program as a standalone. And really what was going to compel them, or be the deciding factor for them, was if they could find a partnership where they could have an active role in the decision-making. One of the most significant things, and one of the things that I'm most proud of with the Partnership for a Dignified Retirement, is that it is a collaborative entity first and foremost. That may raise some concerns in the abstract, but when you strip down a Roth IRA, this is a very ubiquitous and very simple retirement vehicle. This isn't something where you need to have a pretty complex set of investment options. You just need to have a good quality defined contribution lineup that meets some very basic needs, and you need to keep it very generic given the population you're working with.
From that perspective, as we approached designing that investment portion, we understood that really where we were going to need to get input from partner states was, how are we engaging with our recordkeeper, Vestwell, to enhance our service provisions? How are we collecting data in the event we need to make an investment change, how are we going to do that in a timely manner? And because I think we were able to answer those questions, I think that was sort of the deciding factor for those states.
MELISSA
That's great. Thanks. Hunter, let's talk specifically about your state partnership program. Tell us how you measure success.
HUNTER
Right now success across the partner programs is really going to be influenced by the number of funded accounts and then assets under management. And those are obviously aggregate numbers and they're pretty superficial. Going back to that earlier answer of how do we grow this into a proper retirement system? As the programs implement and as they mature in their own right at the state level, that direct engagement with employers and savers is really going to stand out because I think there's any number of success metrics that we could be looking at that we just don't have enough data as of right now to fully assess whether this is going to be helpful or harmful or have any impact at all on savers in their day-to-day financial lives. So, the direct answer to that question is TBD. The metrics that are going to be relevant to the saver population are emerging right now, and that's where we hope to use multiple states as a point of comparison to further identify them.
MELISSA
Great. Okay. Let's talk about future plans, innovations, because you are really right on top of everything here, which is exciting. At this point, and I know you've got a ton going on, but what are the future plans for expanding state partnerships in the context of these auto-IRA programs? And are there any innovative approaches being explored to enhance these collaborations?
HUNTER
I think where the innovation is largely going to be, the question you just had on success metrics, is going to be really critical. Again, I don't think we, financial services as an industry, but also even speaking as a government entity, that we have a really good understanding of the saver population and how they're thinking about their financial futures. I think that's going to be really critical because I think downstream where the innovation is going to be is first in the financial products that are going to be offered. In a standard default retirement plan with target dates, you save in this and then the assumption is you can roll that over and those funds are going to be managed and you'll have an advisor or somebody who's going to help you out as you're spending that money in retirement.
This is, by and large, not a population that is uniformly going to be connected to those types of services. Target dates in particular are a pretty complex financial instrument. Index funds are, well, enormously beneficial and extremely cheap. It’s important to consider what retirement income looks like, and how that's going to allow them to maintain a quality of life during retirement? There have been a number of things that have come up and I know State Street has been in discussions and promoted an annuity or an income option as folks are taking their distributions. How do those fit into a Roth IRA at the end of the day is going to be really critical moving forward. And I think that's going to be a collaboration between investment managers creating the products and the state programs that are facilitating the programs themselves.
Beyond that, I think the innovation is going to be how do we engage directly with these savers and employers and help them understand and get better bought into the idea that saving for retirement has an immediate individual benefit? In the case of Colorado, our low ball estimate was that implementing this program was going to save taxpayers somewhere in the ballpark of $18 billion over 15 years in funds that would have otherwise been directed to public benefit programs, senior supports, housing supports and the like. That has the benefit of creating an environment where folks can feel like going to work doing what they need to be doing on a day-to-day basis is actually helping their surrounding community. But it's also going to create, in an ideal world, an additional degree of flexibility within state government of okay, now we have a population that is hopefully significantly better off financially. What does that actually mean for our policy environment? And more importantly, how is the surrounding economy going to adapt, modify, evolve to accommodate that? And I think that's – I don't have an answer there – I just think in the ideal sense, that is hopefully the goal we can get to in the next 20 years.
MELISSA
It's very interesting. You talk about lifetime income. I worked at a company where the former CEO used to say, in terms of 401(k) plans, they haven't been proven successful yet if you determine success by the ability to provide a retirement income that you cannot outlive. And I think that's true in these programs as well. I do think that that is an innovation that the states very much need to, and are, looking at. So, I applaud you on that. You've talked extensively and quite thoroughly, Hunter, about the engagement that you've been having, particularly with employers and employees, which is fantastic. And I'm curious what kind of feedback you've received from stakeholders so far about the effectiveness of your program and the impact of state partnerships in facilitating retirement savings.
HUNTER
The feedback we received from our state partners is, generally speaking, pretty positive both in terms of the ease that they have in getting to a contract that allows them to actually implement the program. I think, the quickest we've done this is, I think about three months from getting the documents signed to actually launching a program which is pretty fast on a statewide basis. Where we're continuing to receive feedback, and, I had mentioned earlier that the co-governance and collaborative nature of the partnership is something that we're really proud of. The other side of that coin is that, once you get a group of people together with joint decision-making obligations, you have to figure out how to actually make decisions together in a group. We have the core governance on paper, how we actually make decisions, find resolution and work these issues through each individual board and fiduciary is the learning curve that we're working through right now. And we feel really lucky to have both patient and really engaged partners who have a lot of ideas. So, we'll keep building on that as we move forward.
MELISSA
That's great. And you keep adding more and more partners, which is great. Lots more voices, lots more ideas. So, I'd like you to take out your crystal ball now as we come to the end of this interview. What do you envision for the next five years in terms of what the state auto-IRA programs will look like?
HUNTER
I think in the next five years, there's going to be a couple of things that start to happen. I think the first is going to be, and it's one that is a little yuckier to talk about, but the state programs, particularly the mature ones, are going to start figuring out how to enforce their statutes effectively. In Colorado, for instance, there are financial penalties that if you're supposed to comply with this, either by registering with the state program or facilitating a private program or private plan, if you fail to do that, there's a financial penalty there. What that looks like and how that is conducted I think is both critical for the long-term success of these programs because it communicates that there are consequences to not providing this benefit. But I also think that that's going to impact how state programs operate too because, in the case of Colorado, if we did this within the office of the Treasury versus with a partner agency, that's going to impact a lot of things.
The second area of what does this look like long-term, and I think that's where we're hoping to play a leadership role nationally, is building out that communication infrastructure. And I think there's some downstream benefits here. First and foremost, I really struggle to see how somebody who is, in theory, supposed to be engaged in saving through this program over the course of 30 or 40 years is going to continue doing that if we never communicate with them at any point. By building out those channels, I think a couple of things are going to happen. First, we're going to get better data and a better sense of who these folks are. And I think the downstream impact for both investment managers, record keepers, and even some of the private brokers is going to be, who are we missing? Why are they not engaged with our services? And how can we better construct products that are going to meet the needs of this population? And how can we work with state programs to make sure that we offer them and fill all these gaps?
And then beyond that, I think there's going to be a small but noticeable behavioral change that isn't tied to compliance, but rather to people making just better, more informed decisions. If you create an expectation that if you're going to work a job in a state with one of these programs that you're going to have access to a retirement plan is going to change how people engage with the workforce and how they manage their financial futures at some point. I think it's going to be a small shift that you'll see in several years, but the goal is that that becomes a very large one a generation from now.
MELISSA
All right. I have one more question for you. In an ideal world, in your view, what does success look like in terms of access and coverage in retirement plans?
HUNTER
I have a very dry answer on the metric side and then I have a pie-in-the-sky vision. The dry response is in terms of access and coverage. In quantifiable terms, if you're a private employee in a state that is offering an auto-IRA program, whether the employer offers a private plan or the state program, everybody in every occupational setting has access to retirement savings if they decide to do it. That means that everybody is at least being automatically enrolled at some point and that hopefully they find themselves in a financial situation where they feel comfortable saving.
The pie-in-the-sky vision is that, if we really wanted to set an aggressive goal, and I feel comfortable doing that because this is a public-private partnership and one where I think it's going to take a village to solve this problem, I think there's a minimum standard for retirement readiness where, whatever percentage of your income needs to be replaced with a retirement fund or with Social Security or a combination of that. I think if we all take a step back and say, this is an opportunity for everyone in both a business sense and from a long-term public financing and sustainability perspective, that is a very obtainable goal at the state level.
I would just point to one additional innovation that I forgot to mention earlier but because these are Roth IRAs. I mean the orphan account issue is one that is pretty pervasive. This is a good opportunity and where states are building out infrastructure that if you have a bunch of small dollar accounts, maybe we can figure out ways to consolidate and connect people to their accounts. Maybe in an ideal world I can speak as somebody who accesses financial advisory services that at some point we would love every saver in our program to both meet the minimum investment threshold for a lot of these advisors and to be connected to somebody who can help them set goals effectively and understand their individual needs. So the long-term pie-in-the-sky goal once we get close to the access and coverage gap is everybody can maintain a base level quality of life through their own labor and that we can build wealth together and sustain the communities, the employers, the cities and whatever without massive intervention and uncomfortable interventions.
MELISSA
Well, thanks. That's a great answer to end the interview on. Hunter, thank you so much for taking the time to talk to us today and for everything that you are doing and your colleagues, your team in Colorado, to make sure that everybody has a dignified retirement.
